Firedance
by Bishou no Marina
Summary: Under the mad yoke of her paranoid mother, a child struggles to live up to the expectations of a brutal Hero Queen. Her only solace lies in Elise, whose unyielding love helps the terrorized Princess to break through her shell and seize her bitter fate. The light of Revolution lives in the heart, and when a pure heart burns, lives and legacies burn with it. Elise/Heroine (f/f slash)
1. Little Bird

_Linnea: a small, fragile wildflower, often called "twinflower", shaped like a pair of soft pink bells. _

_Its blossoms live for 7 days before they fall._

* * *

**Chapter One**

**Little Bird**

"Linnea, give me space to walk! You always follow me too closely, just like a little bird. You're going to trip me." The Queen turned to face her daughter and frowned, shaking her head. The little waif was so painfully weak, always clinging, head in the clouds, never paying any mind to her surroundings… The Queen could barely stand the sight of her, knowing in her heart that she might never possess the strength to protect herself from the world. There was danger everywhere, and Linnea, with her tilted green eyes—_whore's eyes_, the Queen lamented—lily-white skin (_not a single freckle anywhere, _my_ fault, her father is covered in them)_, red hair (_that _is _her father's fault_), and long, coltish legs, was just the sort of delicate morsel the world craved. Given the chance, it would swallow her up forever. She had to learn to be vigilant. She had to grow up.

Queen Lionheart, who had once been called Sparrow, won her new name when she passed through the Crucible of Westcliff and emerged a champion. She had long since begun to think of life as a vast crucible, an arena from which there was no escape. In life, one had to fight for every breath, had to _earn_ the right to survive with blood and sweat. She had kept her Crucible title so that she would never forget the truth, and she would be _damned_ if her children lived in willful ignorance. She was a Hero, but she was growing old; she would not always be there to teach them discipline.

She bent and looked her daughter in the eye, gripping her upper arms tightly. The girl winced, but she knew better than to try to pull away. "You are _six years old_, Linnea," the Queen said quietly. "I was already caring for myself on the street at your age. I fought every day simply to find food and shelter. You are a Princess, but I will _die_ before I watch you grow into an indolent, spoiled weakling. The castle in which you so comfortably live was _earned_. Your brother understands that well enough. He is very strong, as boys should be. But you're going to be a woman someday, so you will have to work harder than he does, or you will never amount to anything. The Throne will go to Logan when I am gone. He is the Crown Prince. _You_ are redundant. You are nothing, as far as Albion is concerned. You must become useful, or you will live in your brother's shadow for the rest of your life, and you will deserve it. You must grow strong enough to make something of yourself, and you won't do it at my heels, clinging to my skirt. Do you understand, little bird?"

The child lifted her face to stare at her mother, her extraordinary eyes swimming with confused tears. "But…you're wearing pants, Mummy. You said dresses are bad," she said in a small voice, dropping her gaze. "I didn't touch you at all, I promise. I'm sorry, Mummy, I love you, I didn't mean to almost make you trip. I'll be better."

_Sorry, sorry, always sorry, and always promising to do better, but does she ever keep those promises? It's always Mummy this and Mummy that, Mummy, Mummy, Mummy! I hate it. Why can't she call me "Mother" as her brother does?_

The Queen sighed in hopeless frustration as she followed her daughter's shameful gaze to the carpet. "Don't look down at your feet! Straighten your back. The way you walk makes you look like a victim, and if you look like a victim, someone will _make_ you one. You look like easy prey when you slouch. So stand up straight and keep your eyes off the ground. I've told you before what men do to girls like you in dark places, and I thought I had made my point quite clear. Did you forget?"

Linnea stiffened. There was raw horror in her eyes, and that was good, Lionheart decided. "No, Mummy, I remember."

"Good girl." She stroked her daughter's long, lovely hair and smiled, vaguely considering cutting it all off again as she had when Linnea's soft baby curls had grown out. "I'm glad you remember. It's good to pay attention. What I tell you may save your life one day. Do you understand?"

"Yes," she answered quickly, but Lionheart could tell that she did not. How could she? She knew nothing of death.

_That changes today_.

"Come along, little bird," she said, standing up and walking toward the practice room. "I have something very important to teach you today. It's the most important thing you will ever learn."

Linnea hurried to catch up to her, careful to keep her distance. "Thank you, Mummy! I'll try really, _really_ hard." Her desperation to please her mother rang out from every tremulous word like a string of chimes. She stumbled a little as she went, all of her focus divided between not looking at the floor and not walking too closely to the tall, pretty lady who was her entire world, who loved her even when she hurt her or scared her with the Bad Stories about the world outside the castle.

Lionheart lifted the latch and opened the door to the practice room. Though it was midwinter, the hearth was cold and empty, and the warmth of the little body behind her was almost soothing. She hardened herself against it. She was used to the cold, and so was Linnea.

A sheepdog lay beside the hearth, and at the sight of them he lifted his head and thumped his tail against the floor. A stern look from the Queen kept him in his place, but he wiggled with anticipation.

"Toby!"

Linnea, grinning, dashed toward him with her tiny arms flung wide. His tail wagged faster, and he panted, licking her face enthusiastically as she hugged him. She giggled and wiped her cheeks and nose on her sleeve, leaning away from his tongue.

"Toby, you have bad breath!" she scolded him. He dabbed her nose with his, and she giggled again, burying her face in his fur. He rolled onto his back and invited her to rub his belly, and she happily complied, blissfully content.

"I love you, Toby," she whispered, throwing her arms around him. He tried once again to lick her face, but she dodged and leaned against his shoulder with her fingers curled into his thick fur. He was warm and soft, and she hadn't been allowed to play with him at all this week.

Lionheart watched grimly, her arms folded over her chest. The child relied on her dog so much. He was her only friend, and whenever Linnea was unhappy, a few minutes with Toby always banished her sorrow and emptied her mind of the lessons her mother tried so hard to teach her. He was a crutch. His presence in her life fostered weakness. Today she would teach her about crutches. It had to be today, before the arrival of Lord and Lady Laurens, who had a small daughter of their own called Elise. Linnea had to be prepared to forego all distractions. Elise Laurens could easily become an even more dangerous crutch than the dog.

The swish of her muscular thighs as she walked to the high shelf above the mantle was not enough to divert her daughter's attention. Her love for her dog eclipsed even her fear of her mother. She reached for a small, velvet pouch and a parcel wrapped in stiff, brown butcher's paper and carried them to Linnea, who was now blowing air into Toby's nose and laughing as he sneezed and shook his head huffily. Goosebumps rose over the girl's pale skin, but she paid it very little mind. Her hands and feet were toughened from her many forced marches through the snow, which had begun when she was three. She could bear the cold. Nevertheless, it was clear that she found the warmth of her dog comforting in the frigid practice room.

The Queen knelt beside her, unwrapping the parcel. A fresh slap of beef bled over the thick paper and dripped onto the floor, and Toby licked the juice on the floor eagerly.

Linnea smiled euphorically at her mother. "You got that for Toby? That's so nice, Mummy! He's so happy—I can tell! Thank you very, very much!"

Lionheart could not return her smile. This was not the time. She passed the meat to the child and tossed the butcher's paper aside. She opened the drawstring pouch and sprinkled the powder within it over the meat in her daughter's little hands. Linnea did not question her, though curiosity was written all over her glowing face.

"Give it to him, Linnea."

Linnea hesitated, startled by the solemnity in her mother's voice, but she did as she was told. Toby sniffed at the meat, then took it politely into his mouth and began to chew. When he had eaten it all, he sighed contentedly.

"Can I take him out to play, Mummy?" Linnea asked. "He loves the snow. I'll go barefoot, too, Mummy, I don't mind!" she added with a shy, hopeful smile.

"No, little bird. We're going to stay here. Why don't you practice your pushups?"

"Okay, Mummy." She was disappointed.

Lionheart watched the dog as her daughter lowered herself to the floor on her belly and lifted her body with her skinny arms. This, too, she had done for several years, and her form was almost perfect. _Almost_. When she had done thirty, her mother beckoned to her.

"You can rest, darling. Sit beside me. This is your lesson today."

Wiping sweat from her brow with the back of her hand, Linnea returned obediently and sat with her mother. Toby watched them with adoring eyes, panting and drooling heavily. Thick ropes of it dripped from his open mouth.

"Toby?" Linnea reached for him, but he lay his head on the floor and continued his labored panting. "Mummy, why is he acting like that?"

"Animals drool quite a bit when they feel nauseated," the Queen answered smoothly, her eyes locked on the dog.

"You mean…he's sick?"

"He is dying, Linnea."

Linnea's eyes widened until the whites were visible all around her green irises. She wrapped her arms around Toby and began to tremble. He whimpered as his tail lifted weakly, trying to wag for her. "He can't die!" she wailed. Her voice echoed shrilly through the empty room. "He's my best friend in the whole world! We have to save him! You're a _Hero_, Mummy, can't you save him? _Please_! I love him!"

Toby was trembling now, too. Lionheart grabbed her daughter by the collar of her thin shirt and dragged her away from him. She did not hold her, but she maintained a firm grip on the shirt. The dog began to thrash on the floor; he was having a violent seizure. Greenish red foam dripped from his muzzle and he whined pitifully, his eyes rolling over in his head to gaze beseechingly at Linnea. He tried to wag his tail again, but he could not lift it more than a few inches from the floor. His whimpers turned to cries of pain, and Linnea struggled to escape her mother's grasp, reaching for him. But she was strong, and her daughter's fingers could not even brush his coat.

"_Toby_!" she sobbed hysterically, her quick, shallow breaths whistling in her throat. "Toby, don't die! Oh Mummy, Mummy _please_, _please_, _please_! I'll do anything! _Save_ _Toby_!"

"He cannot be saved, Linnea. He is bleeding inside because of the poison. It is a slow process, but Toby is dying, and there is nothing that can stop that, now."

"Poison?" the girl cried, not understanding. "What poison?"

"The poison you fed to him, my daughter. It was in the meat."

Toby lay very still, heaving for breath. A mixture of drool and blood pooled on the floor beneath his head. He was still gazing at Linnea, who had dissolved into shocked tears.

"M-m-mummy," she screamed between huge sobs, hugging herself and rocking as she watched her dog's death throes, "he d-didn't _do anything_! He doesn't deserve to _d-die_!"

"I know. You are so beautiful, little bird," her mother said softly, tucking a lock of her red hair behind one ear and kissing her temple. "It has been a long time since you last cried. You are becoming strong, and I am very proud of you. Today you have learned about death. Death is inevitable. Anyone you know and love can be snatched away from you at any time. For this reason, you must never allow yourself to rely on anyone. You cannot have a crutch in life, or you will fall apart when they leave you. You must be self-sufficient."

She stood and left the room, allowing her daughter to watch Toby's death in privacy.

It took two hours. Linnea was resting her head on his side, listening to his heart. He was so strong. She could almost feel him fighting for his life, fighting to stay with her, and for a moment, hope returned to her. Maybe he wouldn't die… Maybe it was only a Punishment Game. Then she heard his heart stutter and stop, and she forgot how to breathe. She pulled away and looked into his eyes. They were strange…the pupils had grown so large that she could barely tell what color his eyes had been.

"Toby…" the sound was fragile. She was shivering before the empty hearth, stroking her dog's fur. It was still warm, but she could not chase away the chill. It was inside her. She stared at him for a long moment, then lay her head down again and breathed in his scent, and cried.

Sir Walter Beck found her that way an hour later.

"What's this?" he asked, shocked, kneeling by her side and lifting her into his massive arms.

"Toby's dead," she whispered. "He isn't coming back."

Walter sighed and hugged her tightly. "I'm sorry, Princess. He was a good dog. I know you loved him very much, and he loved you, too."

When at last her tears were exhausted, he offered her a warm smile. "You know, I came here to tell you good news."

Linnea simply looked up at him. Her green eyes were swollen and her nose was red and sore.

"Lord Laurens and his wife are coming to stay at the castle for a while. And as luck would have it, their daughter is six, just like you. You even have the same birthday! She is a very nice, pretty girl. I think you will be great friends—think of it, Linnea, a friend to play with! Would you like to meet her?"

Linnea shuddered, remembering what her mother had done to her _last_ friend, and shook her head.

Walter frowned, deeply concerned. "Why not?"

She could not bring herself to say the awful words. She could not tell him what she and her mother had done to Toby. After a long moment, she raised her eyes to meet Walter's. More tears fell, even though she felt as though she had used them all up, and she sniffled and wiped her nose against the back of her hand.

"Walter? Can I ask you for something? Something important?"

"Of course." He smiled warmly, his eyes crinkling at the corners. "Go on, then. What can a grumpy old man do for such a lovely Princess?"

She drew a deep breath and quaked all over. "T-teach me to b-be a Hero," she begged, her chest spasming with the strain of holding her agony at bay long enough to ask for this sacred thing, the thing she wanted more than anything else in the world. "I don't wa-w-want anyone el-else to die." She took a deep breath. "Please…_please_, Walter…. Teach me how to be a Hero."

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_A/N: Thank you so much for taking the time to read and review this story. If you like it, please be sure to follow/favorite and leave your feedback. This is an intensely personal tale, with experiences drawn from my own childhood, and it has been incredibly cathartic to write. My most heartfelt thanks go out to my dear friend, **angelacm**, who gave me the courage to be myself and tell this story.  
_


	2. Blood and Oranges

_Linnea/Linnaea: the favorite, easily-looked-over flower of __**Carl **__**Linnaeus**__,__the Father of Taxonomy._

_There is nothing else like it in the northern wilderness._

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**Chapter Two**

**Blood and Oranges**

**From the Diary of Princess Linnea of Albion:**

_Mother was convinced for most of my life that she would die before she saw her next decade._

_ But she did not. No, it took a very long time for Death to overcome Queen Lionheart._

_ Heroes, she told me, live longer lives than normal mortals do, and I shuddered with both misery and a sick sort of relief. I did not want to lose her, even after all that she had done. She was not Mummy, had not been Mummy for a very long time…but she was Mother, and I loved her, if only from a distance. In my eyes, she was Avo and Skorm, bliss and despair, the ultimate aspect of power. None dared to challenge her, and so our Kingdom lived in peace. She was loved by the people for her past deeds, for her sacrifices, for the 10,000 lives she restored to them at the price of the lives of her sister, her first husband and children, and her dog. His name had been Tobias. My dog had been Toby, a replacement, just as I knew my father and my brother and I were replacements for the family she had lost to Lucien's bullets and the Spire's cruel bargain._

_ We all knew it. _

_Logan and I never spoke of it. He never spoke of much; not to me, not to anyone. On his shoulders was—and is—a burden I cannot hope to understand—the burden of living up to the legacy of our mother, a Hero Queen with the heart and claws of a lion. As a young child, it never occurred to me that our father might know his place in her life far better than we did._

_ The people of Albion called my father Prince Logan the Mad. They call my brother King Logan the Tyrant. Labels! (Had to get a new pen nib. Please forgive the ink blot where the old one broke. The word was 'labels') Can we never escape them?_

_ I do not know when my father first earned his moniker. I remember him as a pale man, thin, somber. He was always in Mother's shadow. He flinched at the slightest narrowing of her sharp, blue eyes. He slept poorly, wandering the castle at night, eating very little, seeing no one but Walter and Mother. _

_I was eight years old when he sealed his name forever in the history books and in my heart. I was eight years old when he signed it in blood before my very eyes._

* * *

"Your Highness?"

I looked up nervously, mid-lunge, with my arms—lithely muscled, now, but still too skinny—extended, my hands clutching iron rods. They were so heavy, and my grip was slippery with sweat, but I did not dare move until the elderly maid in the doorway gave me my instructions. I trembled all over, sick with exhaustion, and waited.

Her eyes, watery and yellowish with age, were…kind. I lost myself in them, basking in their kindness, and somehow the iron did not feel so heavy anymore. There was something else there, too, but I did not understand enough about life to recognize pity when I saw it.

"Madam?" I said hesitantly.

"Oh, _you_," she chuckled. "I'm no one for you to be talking up to, dear. You're the Princess! It's me should be talking up to you! But you are such a sweet girl, m'lady, if you don't mind my saying so. I thought it was high time you met someone as sweet as yourself. She's been clamoring to meet you for two whole years, now! That's a long time for a young lady. Come along with me, now, Highness, and we'll get you cleaned up right and smelling like a rose."

I remained frozen. "Did…" I swallowed. "Is it allowed?"

Another strange look passed over her withered face. "I don't see why not, m'lady. Unless you say otherwise. I'm at your service, Princess."

She smiled, and I could not help but to smile back. I put the irons fastidiously away in their holders on the wall and wiped my hands on my trousers. I trotted to her side and gazed up at her.

"Please," I asked tremulously, treasuring every moment of this rare encounter. "Please, Madam, can you tell me your name? You're very nice," I added in a half-whisper. _Like Walter._

"Matilda," she answered, patting my hand and leading me out of the practice room. "Mattie to my friends. Would you like to be friends, dear?"

"Yes!" I cried, and my heart cried with me. "Thank you…Mattie."

She led out of the castle and up the long steps to my tower, where my bedroom had always been. I liked my tower. From its windows I could look out over the whole garden and watch the people who cared for it, as well as the ones who did not. All of them enjoyed it, and so did I, from my hidden place. The soldiers outside my door gave away my secret, but sometimes I pretended that I was a prisoner, like the ones from my books, and that one day, I would let my hair grow so long that someone would climb it all the way up and take me away from the soldiers, from the castle, from Mu—

I clapped my hands over my mouth in horror. What was I thinking? I loved my Mummy, and even though she was not _nice_ like Mattie, she loved me. How could I even think of leaving her? The soldiers were there to protect me, and she had put them there. _Stupid, stupid, stupid_! I tugged at a lock of my hair until it hurt.

"Here, now, stop that!" Mattie unwound the loop of red hair from around my fingers and smoothed it away from my face. "You mustn't do that, Your Highness. You mustn't hurt yourself. The scabs on your knees are quite enough, I should think! Now, let's get you into the bath while the water is hot."

_Hot_?

I followed her gaze to the copper tub in the center of the room. Steam rose from it the way it sometimes did from a bowl of soup. _Am I to drink it_? I wondered, peering doubtfully over the edge. _There's so much_…. It looked like water, except not so clear…and there were flower petals and whole oranges floating on top! Someone's thumbnail had pierced each shining skin, letting just the smallest trickle of fragrant juice seep into the steamy tub.

"Mattie," I said uncertainly, staring up at her, eyes wide. "I think maybe someone made an accident… Did this come from the kitchens?"

"Of course! Where else, darling?" She seemed to come to a realization, and smiled knowingly. "Ah, I see… Don't worry, Your Highness, it's natural for little girls to be shy. I'll turn my back while you undress and get in. I won't peek! You can trust my word. Old ladies don't make promises we can't keep. We know better."

She turned away with her hands clasped neatly behind her back, standing upright with only the tiniest of her iron-gray curls escaping from the edge of her starched bonnet. I eyed the flowery stew again for a moment, then pulled my shirt over my head and took off my pants and smallclothes, hanging them over the edge of my linen rack. I tested the steaming stuff with one finger. It felt a _little _like soup…like a very thin broth I had been given when I was younger and sick with colds. But that had smelled like chicken and herbs. This smelled…_pretty_.

I dipped my foot into the tub and felt an immediate shiver work its way all the way from my toes to the roots of my hair. What I was doing felt strange and wrong, but Mattie said it was all right, and Mattie was my friend. I put my other foot in and slowly lowered myself until I was sitting on the bottom of the tub with the flower petals and oranges floating around my neck. It felt _heavenly_, and I sighed with happiness. Nothing had ever felt so _good_. Nothing! The smell was so lovely that my mouth began to water. If it _felt_ this good, surely it would _taste_ even better!

"_Linnea_?!"

I paused in my slurping and tilted my head to look at Mattie, who was caught between shock—I knew _that_ face—and amusement. The soup did not taste very good; only the faintest hint of oranges had made it into the hot water. Maybe it wasn't finished… Startled to tears by the sudden conviction that I was sitting in someone's supper, I made to leap out of the soup, and Mattie scooped me into her arms. I stumbled away from her, horrified by the watery mess I had made of her clean frock, but she followed me and knelt in front of me, holding my slippery shoulders in her gnarled, bony hands as I quivered.

"I'm sorry!" I cried. "I'm so sorry, Mattie!"

Something was happening behind her old eyes, something I could not see very well through the haze of my tears, much less understand. Finally, she said, very softly, "We are friends, aren't we, Princess?"

I nodded vigorously, wiping away the hated tears.

"I'm glad. Since you call me Mattie, may I call you Linnea when it's just the two of us?"

"Yes, Mada—Mattie," I stammered.

"Linnea," she continued, still speaking just above a whisper, "you thought this was something to eat, didn't you?"

I looked up at her in bewildered shame. "I don't understand…it isn't?"

"No, it isn't. Was it the oranges, dear?"

"Yes ma'am. And it was hot, like soup."

"Merciful Avo," she whispered, drawing me to her chest. In the soft darkness there, I could not see the tears in her eyes, but I heard them in her voice. It had gone croaky and strange, the way mine sometimes did. "Tell me about baths, Linnea. What are they like?"

"Cold water. Soap. Then you dry off," I answered, pleased to have the chance to show her I wasn't _completely_ stupid.

My head rose and fell with her bosom as she sighed deeply, shaking her head. "Oh, child. I will have the _hide_ of whoever told you that little lie, by Avo, I will!" She held me at arm's length again, stroking my hair. "Who was it, Linnea?"

I did not understand. I felt uncomfortable all over. "My…my Mummy taught me how to take baths."

Mattie's eyes widened and she hugged me again, whispering things that sounded like prayers into my hair and sniffling. After a long moment, she led me back to the tub. Her face was grave and wet. "I am so sorry, child. I have to break a promise, and I told you that it is not something that old ladies do, didn't I? We old ladies are sometimes very foolish, you know, as well. There will be no hidings, Avo forgive me. I…" She shook her head again and wiped her nose on her handkerchief. "Dear Linnea… Do you like _this_ kind of bath?"

I smiled and nodded fervently. "Oh yes! It feels so good. I won't drink it again, I promise!"

She chuckled a little at that. "I think that would be best, dear. Now, clean yourself up so we can meet your guest. There's a special outfit for you, just for the occasion. My own younger brother made it, you know! Dear Jasper has always been far better at that sort of thing than I. I daresay you will be seeing him a good deal more than you will see me, soon."

I did not understand the significance of her words at the time. I only knew that after Mummy found out about the bath, Mattie disappeared forever. Baths were cold again for a long, long time, but I missed her kind eyes and her voice far more than I missed the sweet oranges and the steam.

* * *

I stood in the center of my room, where the tub had been before some men from the kitchen carried it away. Mattie, too, had gone away after a long look at me, a sad smile, and a gentle kiss that I still felt on my warm cheek. I gazed longingly at the bookcase as I fidgeted with my new clothes. I wanted to sit in the sunshine and read and go away from here, just for a little while. My hair was brushed to glossy smoothness and it hung in sheets over the shoulders of my beautiful outfit. It had a real bodice and a short skirt, with soft leggings underneath which I thought made it all right. It wasn't a dress, not _really_. Dresses did not have pants, which was why they were bad, according to Mummy. Maybe she would like these clothes. I felt so grown up in them, and she wanted so much for me to _grow_ _up_. I thought I might even be…pretty… My hair was only a little less red than the flower petals in the water had been. Not like apples, but not like oranges, either. It was somewhere in between, like my father's, and he was the handsomest man I had ever seen. I thought he was probably the handsomest man in the world.

The door opened, and I jumped a little, straightening unconsciously. The tall figure of a soldier-man stood framed in the doorway, and then he entered, stepping to one side…and then, for the first time in my life, I saw her.

"Your Royal Highness, Lady Elise Laurens, daughter of Lord Alain Laurens and his Lady wife, Marianne," the soldier said formally without looking at either of us.

My eyes were not my own. I could not look away from the girl who was now dropping into a perfect curtsy in front of me, holding the hem of her elegant dress in her hands. The soldier waited for a moment, then bowed and left the room, shutting the door behind him.

We were alone, and I was paralyzed.

The day had been my first real exposure to pretty things, and I knew with a wave of admiration that Elise _was_ beauty. She was like the oranges and the flowers in the hot bath, and her smile was kind, like Mattie's, but without Mattie's sadness. Her hair was a wild mass of red-gold curls, and her eyes were big and blue. My mother's eyes were blue, but they were different… Mummy's eyes were like the sky in winter. Elise's eyes were the blue of the oceans from my books, the ones that read _Sirens—Beware! _in scrolled letters over the cerulean waves where smiling mermaids beckoned. They were warm.

"Your Highness," she said, curtsying again and looking at me patiently.

I realized that she was waiting for me to say something. I remembered Logan telling me that only the noblest person in a room could begin a conversation. I swallowed hard. Elise looked much nobler than I did with her pretty gown and the big red ribbon in her hair.

"I'm Linnea," I said nervously. "I—you can talk to me like anyone else. I'm no one, really. My brother is the Crown Prince."

"You can't be _no one_," she answered, wrinkling her nose. "You're standing here, aren't you?" She made a face and covered her mouth with the back of her hand. "Sorry. My Mum and Dad say I'm ill-mannered. I guess they're right. Is it all right?"

"Yes," I said, beaming. "I'm ill-mannered, too! Erm…is it all right if I call you…Elise?"

"You're a Princess," she laughed. "You can call me _Elliot_ if you want to. I really hope you don't, though. That's a silly _boy's _name. Linnea," she said shyly, smiling. "You have a pretty name, Your Highness. I like it a lot."

"Elise is a lovely name, too," I hastened to assure her, hanging on her every word and gesture. I had never known a girl my own age before, and she was so nice, so pretty, so…_different_. She looked much more like a Princess than I did.

"Sir Walter sent me to see you because today is my birthday and it's yours, too. We're both eight now," Elise declaimed, picking at her sleeve and looking all around the large room. Then she clapped her hands and grinned. "Oh! A piano! You have one in your _room_? I wish I did!"

"I don't know how to play it," I admitted bashfully. "But you can if you want to. You know Walter?"

She sat down gracefully at the piano bench, sweeping her curls behind her shoulders with a toss of her head. She glanced over her shoulder at me and smiled. "Sir Walter is my best friend. He told me that since you're his best friend, too, that makes _us_ friends. I was so happy! Come sit with me, Linnea! I can show you how to play."

Gingerly, I sat beside her on the smooth, wooden bench, watching in fascination as her small, pale hands moved over the keys, plunking out a slightly clumsy but very pretty tune. Though it was dusted every day and tuned regularly, no one had played the piano in years. My father used to love to play, and I knew he wanted to teach me, but he had gotten sick. He didn't sleep anymore, and I never saw him eat. But he was still my handsome Daddy, and I grinned when I thought of how I would surprise him at the piano when he finally got better.

Elise's feet were doing something to the pedals on the floor, but I was mesmerized by her fingers. They were less rigid now, and the music changed. I couldn't think of why, but it made me think of the flower petals and the oranges again. It was…sweet.

Abruptly, Elise slapped her hands on as many of the keys as she could reach, and the piano gave out a loud, horrible sound that made us both laugh. She turned and grinned at me, blushing.

"I made up that last song. It's stupid, though."

"No, it's not stupid," I said earnestly. "It was so pretty, Elise. I wish I knew how to do that."

"Here…give me your hands."

She put my fingers on some of the keys, tugging at or bending them where she saw fit. "You're not ill-mannered, Linnea," she murmured as she worked.

"What do you mean?"

"When my piano tutor did this, I cried and screamed and tried to _bite_ her and said I wasn't going to do what she wanted because it hurt my fingers. You're just as quiet as a mouse in a house."

"It doesn't hurt," I laughed. "You rhymed! Can you do poetry?"

She snorted. "_No_."

"As quiet as a mouse in a house or a louse on a grouse in the blouse of your spouse, your spouse, the bally blue blouse of your spouse," I intoned absently.

"A _what_ in the blouse of your _spouse_?!" Elise leaned back and giggled, holding herself with both arms.

"A lousy grouse!" I declared with a wide grin, feeling like I had at last done something right.

"You're good, Linnea," she said, dabbing at her eyes with a lacey handkerchief embroidered with her initials. "How do you do that?"

I hit a key with my finger experimentally. A high-pitched _pling_ filled my ears and my heart. "I like—I _love_ to read," I confessed. "Books are my favorite thing. Sometimes they have poetry, but it doesn't always have to rhyme. I like the ones that rhyme best, though."

"You have a lot of them," she observed, eyeing the shelves around my bed.

I bit my lip. Elise was my friend…and Walter told me that friends could tell each other secrets. "Can I show you something?"

She hopped off the bench and smoothed the silk dress until there were no wrinkles at all, and I led her to a much smaller bookcase near the fire. Resting my hand on its varnished wood surface, I smiled. "This one isn't a bookcase all the time," I murmured. "Sometimes…it's a _door_."

Her blue eyes widened, and her fingers closed over my arm in excitement. "Can we go in?"

I was proud to have someone to share my secret with, proud to have a _good_ secret to share instead of all that bad ones I was never allowed to talk about. I winked at Elise and took a button hook from my wardrobe. She watched in fascination as I showed her the difference between the depth of the back of the bookcase and the distance from the edge of the shelving to the wall. The shelves were too shallow.

"There's something in there…" Elise whispered.

"Yes, and no one else knows," I replied delightedly. "Watch this!"

Carefully sliding the button hook into a thin crevice between the bottom of the bookcase and the wooden back, I tugged until the back panel slid upward enough for the uppermost shelf to touch the top panel of the case. The lower part of a second, unpainted backing was revealed, and I reached for the metal mechanism set into its side, turning it. I heard a faint clanking sound—pressure plates, though I had no idea at the time—and let the false back fall back into place with a satisfied smile. I put the button hook away and Elise followed hypnotically. A cool breeze tickled our ankles from beneath my vanity table, and she gasped and grabbed my hand.

"A secret passageway!"

"Yes," I said, shivering with excitement. "I found it last year, and no one knows about it…no one but Walter…and you."

"Because we're friends," she finished with a beam. "Where does it go?"

"That's the best part! It goes to the kitchens!"

"So you can knick food whenever you want?"

I looked down. "No."

"Well why not? We could even go right now!"

"No," I repeated, unable to meet her eyes. "I can't do things I'm not allowed to do, Elise."

"_I_ won't tell," she said, horrified. "We're friends, Linny. I'm no snitch. Mum says it isn't ladylike to snitch and I think she's probably right."

I closed the passage and looked at her in wonder. "You do things you're not supposed to do?"

"Maybe…" she giggled.

"But what if you get caught?"

"Ugh, I _hate_ getting caught." She rolled her eyes. "Mum and Dad lecture me for_ever_, and sometimes they take my toys for a week or make me practice my penmanship even _more _than I already do because," she said darkly, "they know I _hate_ writing. So I just try really hard not to get caught. I get better at it all the time, you know. They thought they were so smart, teaching me about how repetition makes you better at things. Well! I'll show them who's smart! I practice doing what I want without getting caught so much that now I'm really, really good at it. _Much _better than I am at piano or handwriting or arithmetic." She stuck out her tongue. "They think they're punishing me, but I know better. All those extra chores make me better at what I _really_ want to do, which is _whatever I want_, without anyone catching me at it."

I had no idea what to say. I had certainly never thought of my mother's lessons like that. Of course, nothing Elise mentioned sounded a thing like a real punishment, to me, so maybe she was misunderstanding her parents' aims. I did not dare to challenge her, though. Her friendship was like a delicate glass ball in my trembling hands. One slip, I thought, and it could be shattered forever.

I jumped as my door opened once again, and once again, the figure of a man was framed by strong stone and sunlight. My mouth fell open and Elise fell into a deep curtsy at once.

He was tall and thin, covered in freckles, dressed in luxurious silks. But his thin, red hair was disheveled and his pale face was drawn with sorrow.

"Dad," I whispered. After a moment, I recovered and remembered the soldier's introduction. "Your Royal Highness, this is Lady Elise Laurens, daughter of…er…"

"Lord Alain and Lady Marianne Laurens," she finished smoothly. "It is an honor to meet you at last, Sire."

He nodded absently. "Yes…yes it is…an honor." He looked down at me and raked his fingers through his hair. His eyes sat deeply in his head, hollow and bloodshot with exhaustion. "I've just been to speak with your mother, Linnea. I think you'd better come with me. Elise, you may stay here, if you wish, and help yourself to books, or…" his long fingers brushed the surface of the piano almost wistfully, then dropped to his side.

He walked out onto the stone parapet, where the guards stood stiffly at attention, and I followed him with a worried glance over my shoulder. Elise hurried to the door and caught it before it could close. I saw her big blue eyes in the tiny crack and felt a small surge of confidence. She was watching. My friend was watching and waiting for me.

My father took a deep breath and let out a sigh that seemed to last forever as he looked over the wall. "I heard about the bath," he said softly. "I never knew—never dreamed—that you were being made to endure such hardship at the hands of your mother."

"I'm all right, Dad, really—" I made to hug him, but he pushed me away with what seemed like a titanic effort, gritting his teeth.

"You don't understand, Linnea," he groaned, and I felt my heart break with the sound. "You don't understand because you know nothing else. It's every bit as much my fault as it is hers. She did not treat Logan the way she has treated you, and I have been…I have been a coward. I turned a blind eye to the 'training' and the 'lessons' not because I thought she was the more capable parent, but because I had no idea how to stop her. I convinced myself that I was a prisoner, just like you, a Prince with no true political power, no Heroic blood, no way to take care of my family. No way to stop a Hero Queen from doing as she sees fit."

"Dad…"

"So I hid away. I punished myself every moment of your life, tried to suffer with you, because I could not protect you. But I was wrong. Sir Walter Beck has done all that he can to give you some measure of comfort, and he knows even more than I do what your life has been like, and how much a little comfort matters if you are to survive it. And what have I done?" He laughed bitterly. "I have made excuses, mourned for my life that _was_, wished for things to be different—in short, _nothing_. I'm in mourning for my old life, and spending all of my time missing the past and feeling sorry for myself when there are still people to care for all around me. Isn't that the most disgustingly selfish thing you've ever heard, dear?"

"No, Sir. Of course not. You love me," I said, wrapping my arms around his waist. "I love you, Dad. I like my life. Walter gave me a friend."

He winced as though I had stabbed him and held me tightly, at last. "Yes, he did. He's a good man…a far better man than I. He lost his family, and he does not mope, even during occasions like today, which he surely would have liked his family to see, because you are the closest thing he has to a daughter. No, Sir Walter continues to live, honoring his lost loved ones by loving the ones he still has, and _protecting them_ to the best of his abilities. He's a far better man, a far better father."

I swallowed hard, speechless. I did not understand at all what he was trying to say.

"Still," he said with a slightly hysterical chuckle, "still, there is something I can do to make up for all of that. I'm a failure—I know that. As a father, as a ruler, as a husband. I am weak. But I love you, Linnea, and I want the best for you. I truly do. That girl, Elise, is good for you. But you know as well as I do that your mother will snatch her away from you in a heartbeat if she thinks you are relying on her too much. So, my first gift for you on this auspicious occasion, your eighth birthday, is advice: learn to conceal your feelings, Linnea. You are too easy to read, and your mother is a master reader. In the presence of others, you must feign indifference toward Elise if you wish to protect her. Do you understand?"

"I must pretend she isn't my friend," I said dutifully.

He gripped my shoulders tightly. His hair fell into his face in red hanks. "More than that. You are such a kind child. You must pretend she is as interesting to you as a—a doorknob. Treat her as though you do not even see her." A shadow fell over his eyes. "Still there will be punishment today. I've just heard that Matilda has been taken away for giving you a warm bath. Now this…this girl-child you've befriended… Your mother needs to believe a grave lesson has been learned, and I need freedom." He stood up straight again and smiled down at me, showing too many teeth.

I began to tremble. "Dad, you're scaring me."

"I know. Hold on to that feeling and scream as loudly as you possibly can, little Linnea. Scream for your mother. Walter will come, of course, but your mother must know that it was to her and her alone that you cried. Trust Walter. Trust him in _all things_, Linnea. Swear it to me!"

"I swear," I whispered.

He bent and pressed a long, dry kiss to my cheek. "That's a good girl. Go stand by your door, won't you?"

My feet obeyed my father without hesitation, but the rest of my body was under my control, so I walked backward until I felt the door open a little behind me, where Elise waited. My father drew a pistol from its holster at his hip.

"Dad?" I moaned, trying to go back to him. Elise grabbed me under the arms and pulled me away.

"Don't!" she hissed. "We're not to go near guns!"

The soldiers on the wall looked from the Prince to their comrades, then back at the Prince, who stroked the barrel of the gun with long fingers and then slowly slid it into his mouth. The sun glinted on the metal and then disappeared. I screamed, Elise gasped, the soldiers cried out and rushed him, but it was too late. The tall, thin, freckled man pulled the trigger and collapsed against the railing. I could hardly hear the report of the gun over my own screams. I clawed myself loose from Elise's arms and ran to my father. Blood gushed like a red-black fountain from his nose and mouth, so much that it splattered high enough to dot his forehead. The top of his head was gone, replaced by something gray and not entirely solid. And still the torrential blood rained, forming a pool in his chest and quickly cascading onto the stones.

With all that was left of my mind, I remembered his final words, and as the soldiers pulled me away, I lifted my head and filled my lungs with the coppery air. I could not speak. I knew that without trying. But I could scream.

* * *

Many hours later, I was lying alone in my bed, still so shocked that I could not cry. My father was dead—had shot himself…for me? No. Because he was sad. He didn't know what else to do. But he had shot himself _in front_ of me for a reason, and I did not really understand it, even though he meant me to.

_Try harder! _I commanded myself, yanking at a lock of my hair so hard that I felt the flashfire of roots popping loose at the scalp.

There was a soft clanking sound.

I froze.

Something was sliding into my room. My mind whirled with stories of ghosts and hollow men, and I slowly reached for the dagger under my pillow, turning onto my stomach so that I could turn my head left or right, and spring backward if necessary.

And then, as softly as a summer breeze, the sheets rose and fell on my right side, and I found myself face to face with Elise Laurens. She pulled the sheets up over our heads, but through them the bright light of the moon allowed me to see that she had been crying. Her enormous eyes were reddish and bruised-looking. A tear still clung to her upper lip, and she wiped it away before reaching for my hand.

"I'm sorry," she whispered.

I slid the dagger away and it clattered onto the floor. She did not even notice. Her eyes were locked on mine.

"I heard everything," Elise said softly. "I heard it all. You can pretend I'm a tree, pretend we're not friends. I don't mind. _I _know we _are_. Forever."

"Forever," I repeated numbly, and then she wrapped her arms around me, and I finally began to cry.

She smelled of oranges.

* * *

_Thank you, angelacm, deathofaraven, Kami2015, Auriel, and Writingwolf14, for your kind feedback and support. :) - Marina_


	3. Trial by Fire

_Linnea was once believed to make up a part of the honeysuckle family._

_We now know that Linnea belongs to a family entirely its own._

* * *

**Chapter Three**

**Trial by Fire**

The steel was growing warm in my hand. I stood bolt upright without needing to think about it, one hand behind my back, the other holding my sword in perfect vertical before my face as I saluted my enemy.

_He is _not_ your enemy_, I reminded myself calmly as we both whipped our blades away from our faces and into a ready position. He favored a rigid stance, but I preferred to be as fluid as possible, ready to strike with my offhand or my foot whenever the opportunity presented itself, just as I had been taught. _He is practice._

"I do not see what I could possibly have to learn from a fourteen-year-old girl," he said scornfully.

"That is why you will lose," I retorted. In all things, where he was ice, I was fire. _He is not your enemy, _I reminded myself with a toss of my head. _He is not the enemy…. He is not THE enemy… But… _But I wanted to fight him so badly that I was having trouble keeping my sword steady.

"Enough, both of you!" Walter boomed from his place beside the sword rack. "Or have you forgotten the point of that bloody salute? Try to forget for a moment that you're both teenage royalty and _respect_ one another."

That shut us up. Walter's word was law in the practice room, and though I probably loved him more than Logan did, we both wanted to please him…just as we both wanted to please _her_.

Our mother stood beside the door with her arms crossed. She was absolutely still, surveying her two children as we faced each other with real weapons in hand. Dulled edges were a comfort of the past, and our only armor was our discipline. If Logan and I were not very careful, one of us could be badly injured. But if we hesitated, _both_ of us would suffer. Her eyes followed us relentlessly. They were the whips at our backs and the daggers at our throats. My brother and I knew we were slaves, but there was a disgusting sort of pride in our hearts that drove us to please our mistress, even if it meant hurting each other.

Or killing each other.

I looked at my brother. I knew what I was fighting for. But did he? Was it approval? Was it validation and status? Or did he, too, want to be a Hero and put an end to all of this madness? If not for Elise, I would never have known it _was_ madness. _Elise_… I felt my anger ebb away. Elise would hate it if I let myself be drawn into this pointless emotional game. _He is practice_, I reminded myself. _That is all. Walter won't let anything happen._

Despite myself, I gave a small bark of a laugh at that. Anything could happen. Walter tried, but he could not stop her. Only a Hero could do that. Neither Logan nor I had shown any Heroic potential, as far as we had been told.

But I was determined to find some.

"Remember your training, you two…. Begin!"

Walter's silence had been the sole thing tethering us to the sanity of the stone floor beneath our feet, and my brother and I were rushing each other before he had completed the second syllable of that powerful word. _Begin_! My sword struck his like a viper, sending stinging jolts of pain up my arm, and from the look on his pale face, his, as well. He twisted away and struck back, sweeping low. I blocked, but while my feet danced out of the way as any sane swordsman's would, I decided to keep them moving. With my sword firmly locked with his, I took advantage of our low position to crush his instep with the heel of my shoe. His face reddened in pain and his eyes dropped to his injured foot for the briefest of moments. It was long enough for me. I grabbed his wrist and smashed his mouth open with the handguard of my freed sword, quickly ducking into a defensive stance again.

_You could finish him, take him down NOW and for good! _I shook my head. That was not me. That was my mother's training.

He swore through the bleeding ruin of his lips and spat on the floor. We both looked to our mother for a moment, but she only nodded and said, "Scars become a King. They show that he is not soft. Fight on."

_How long, Mother_? I thought bleakly. _Until one of us is screaming for a doctor? Until a doctor would be useless…redundant, the way _I_ am redundant?_

I tried to apologize with my eyes as Logan spat again, but he simply shook his head and brought his sword to the ready.

"The empty hand is the most dangerous weapon in a swordfight," I whispered as softly as I could. It was a lesson learned from Walter, one of my first, and it would have saved his mouth.

"_Shut. It._" His pride was hurt, but it was more than that. He could not allow Mother to see him being lectured by a little girl. He was supposed to know all of this already. He was supposed to be stronger than I was.

…But he _wasn't_.

The shock of this revelation nearly lost me the fight _and_ an eye. I evaded only just in time, locking blades once again with my brother, nineteen years old and skinny, with blood in his mouth and desperation in his black eyes. I felt a surge of pity for him. I had spent my life envying him, resenting him, almost hating him, wanting just a small sign of love and getting nothing from him but frost. But the more we fought, the more I began to understand him. Everything he did, he did because in his mind, _there was no other choice_. There was no Elise in his life. No friend to give him perspective. There was only Mother, sitting on his shoulder like a demon and dripping poison into his ear.

_Mother_.

This was _sick_. Sparks flew from the next clash of our blades, and my stomach twisted in revulsion. This was _wrong_. And it did not take a Hero to end this. The power was in my hands. I could almost feel it moving my blade and my body for me. I drifted in thrall of my purpose, dodging, blocking, lulling him into a false sense of security as we moved closer to the hearth…closer to the place where Toby had bled to death in places no bandages could fix.

It happened when my foot touched the tile his dying body had warmed all those years ago. Logan's eyes were bright with the very _taste_ of conquest and victory; he did not yet realize how disgusting it all was. But I did. And I had decided that enough was enough.

Yes, enough was _bloody well _enough.

He was so tall. He treated it like a strength, but it was a weakness. I dropped to the floor again. Instinctively, he moved away, protecting his legs and feet. In those precious seconds, I swept his sword to one side with mine, rolled to my feet and headbutted him in the solar plexus, driving the wind out of him. He staggered back another step, and I kicked his leg out from under him, knocking his sword out of his hand with another hard blow. He landed on his shoulder with a wince, and the sword landed near the empty hearth.

"Yield, Logan!"

"I_ can't_," he hissed through his teeth. He drove a fist into the side of my knee and I fell, biting off a cry of pain. It wasn't broken, I knew but it would be some time before I walked without a limp.

We struggled on the floor, grunting and panting. He outweighed me and outreached me, and I found myself on my back beneath him. He struck me with the heel of his hand, and spots dotted the room around me, popping across his furious, terrified face. I groaned. He raised his hand again, then hesitated. There was sorrow too deep for words in his eyes. Blood from his mouth dripped onto my face like hot tears and ran down my neck. He was so big, and I was so small. It gave him pause because he was not a monster, and his humanity gave me an opening. I hated myself for it, but I knew that I had to do it, because he could not yield.

My hand closed over the little finger of his hand. I wrenched it to the left and he cried out, following its course—he _had _to. If he didn't, something would break. As he leaned toward his pinky, I slid my leg over his hip and pushed upward, tipping him over and rolling on top of him. I hit him twice in the mouth, rolled backward onto the tiles and squeezed his upper leg between my thighs as tightly as I could, tucking his foot under my arm. I turned him onto his side to bend his leg and clamped my hands together, trapping his ankle between my wrists. My abdominal muscles tightened and I jerked left and right, twisting until I felt something pop in Logan's knee. He screamed, and inside, I screamed with him.

"I'm sorry, Logan. I'm so sorry," I sobbed, panting as I released him. He rolled onto his back, holding his knee and gasping for breath, pain etched deeply into his features. It aged him.

I picked up his rapier and studied Walter's grave reflection in its shining surface. Then with a grunt, I snapped it in half against my thigh. I did the same with my own sword, and, holding the pieces in one hand, I offered the other to my brother. He shook his head. He needed a doctor.

Mother was still watching speculatively, and I walked to her, eyes blazing. I dropped the broken swords at her feet. The clatter of steel rang through the hall, and I resisted—just barely—the urge to spit on them.

"You _knew_," I accused softly. "You knew I would win, and you made me fight Logan, anyway. You hurt and humiliated him for _nothing_."

Stars exploded against a white curtain of pain that faded to red and, for a moment, gray. My hand moved to my nose and came away bloody. The pommel of Mother's dagger was shiny with it. My mouth dropped open. I couldn't breathe.

"A battle doesn't end when you're disarmed, little bird," she said scathingly. "It certainly does not come to a halt simply because you decide you don't want to fight anymore. If this were anything but a trial, you would be dead."

"The battle was with _Logan_, not you! He's badly hurt and I _won't_ fight anymore!" I could feel the stinging heat of budding tears at the corners of my eyes, but they did not come. I had not cried since I was eight. "This isn't—"

"Fair?" she offered, her eyes flat and dark with mounting anger. She raised her dagger again, and through the dull thudding of blood in my ears, I could hear Walter's voice, but I could not process whatever it was that he was saying. "Do you honestly still believe in _fairness_?"

I tried to dodge the next blow, but I was bleeding a river down my front and my eyes were beginning to swell shut. Solid steel struck my temple and I faded again under the weight of a flashflood of nausea, staggering into something cold and hard and loud. A suit of armor, I supposed. I would have fallen, but my fingers found their way into the visor slit and I held on like a stumbling drunkard.

"I taught you to expect the unexpected. An enemy's knife can come from anywhere at any time. You have to be ready to meet it, even in your sleep. I don't understand why you have such trouble with this simple concept. You aren't a simple girl." Her fingers brushed sticky threads of hair out of my bleeding face, and I flinched away from them. She smiled and laughed quietly. "You're just stubborn. That can be a virtue, if you know where to apply it. _No_, Sir Walter, move back to your station, please. This is between mother and daughter. My strong, beautiful daughter…"

The honey in her voice, that sickening sweetness that always followed a particularly brutal lesson, jarred me to full consciousness. I hated it so much. It was not the pain, but the _sweetness_ that broke me every time. The _sweetness_ had brought tears back in the days when I'd still had tears to shed. Her gentle hand was unbearable. I wanted to relax—the lesson was over—but I couldn't. Not while that hand stroked my hair. I knew how easily it could turn into a fist and _yank_. My hair had grown out again, long enough now to touch my shoulder blades, and her fascination with my beauty always bordered on repulsion. She might decide to take that dagger and saw it all off. She had done it before.

_Should I strike her now?_ I wondered, watching her closely. _What will she do if I do? What will she do if I _don't_?_

_Avo help me, what am I supposed to do? She is stronger than I am. She always will be. She's a Hero and I'm nothing._

Something snapped in my mind, then. She didn't see it in my eyes because I could barely open them—and that, I realized with horrified giddiness, was my advantage. My hand shot out and grabbed her by the wrist, twisting it as hard as I could, turning her elbow into her body and her palm toward the ceiling. She gasped, the fingers of her free hand still tangled in my hair, and I smacked the dagger out of her weakened grasp with my other hand. It fell to the floor. She tried to pull my face forward by the hair, but I jerked away and felt my scalp tear. I didn't care. The pain sharpened my vision, kept my head above the sluggish pool of unconsciousness that threatened to swallow me whole. I had taken too many blows to the skull today. I had to be very quick. I—

I saw a web of blue lines on my mother's skin. Something struck me with incomprehensible force, and I smelled something faintly pleasant before my grip on the waking world slipped through my fingers.

It was ozone.

* * *

It was dark when I opened my eyes again. I was vaguely aware of the bitter aftertaste of a healing potion in my mouth and the softness of pillows beneath my head. What came next was incredible pain, not only from my injuries, but also—and this was much worse—from the memory of Logan's terrible scream, its awful glassiness as I...

_No_, _no, I didn't want to do that!_ Why hadn't he _yielded_? I gritted my teeth and closed my eyes. I was angry at him, furious with him for making me hurt him instead of yielding.

But that wasn't quite right, was it?

_I can't_, he had said, and it was true. I was angry with the wrong person. Logan had had no more choice than I. He had never asked for any of this. I remembered the agony in his eyes when he hesitated after his first blow, the way he had looked from his loose fist to my bleeding face, the face of…what had he said? _A fourteen-year-old girl_. In his eyes, I was still a child.

"Logan," I whispered through lips as dry as parchment. "Oh gods, Logan, I'm so sorry…"

Something soft brushed my cheek. I lashed out reflexively, grabbing the intruder by the throat, crushing the pulsing vein against my forearm to block its flow. A mass of soft curls buffeted my face and small hands gripped my arm weakly. I let go and jerked away in horror.

"Elise?" I moaned, drowning in self-loathing.

"Linnea…" she rasped. Her hand moved to her throat and massaged it. In the moonlight I could see the color draining from her face.

"I'm so sorry, Elise! Oh great gods above! I'm so sorry. Are you all right?"

She nodded. "Yes, I'm all right. I didn't mean to scare you."

"There is no excuse for what I just did. In seconds you would have been unconscious. Are you sure you're all right?"

"I'm fine," she said firmly. "It's you I'm worried about, Linnea. Do you know how long you've been sleeping?"

"I… It must have been all day. The last thing I remember is—" I stopped, recalling the smell of ozone, the smell of the air before a storm. My hands went to my side and froze.

_There was a _hole _in my body, sweet Avo there was a hole, there was a _hole!

I began to tremble, fingering the bandage that covered the place where, hours ago, a bolt of lightning had passed through my flesh. How had I survived?

Thin arms slipped around me, pulling me close to a warm, soft body. Elise was cradling me against her chest, resting her chin on my head and rocking slowly. I felt her heart beating against my cheek. Her lips were soft against my brow, and instead of electricity, I smelled sweet perfume, something light and flowery she had dabbed over her chest and behind her ears. After a moment, I realized that it was orange blossom.

For the first time in six years, I cried.

When it was over, she lifted her head and dabbed at my face with her handkerchief. "Thank goodness," she said, smiling.

I looked at her questioningly.

"It's just that you've been holding everything inside for so long, and it hurts so much to watch you." She frowned, leaned over me, and carefully lit the candle beside my bed. Its warm light lent a glow to her face, where her blue eyes blazed beneath moist lashes. I realized with a shock that she had been crying, too. "I know it's treason to say this, but I don't care: that woman is no mother to you. She may be a good politician, a good queen, but she's a monster. If the people knew what she was doing to you and Logan, they would toss her arse right off that throne, Hero or not."

I was stunned. It _was_ treason. But there was a secret thrill, something agonizing and freeing at the same time, in hearing her say it. My heart began to beat faster. It seemed to have taken up residence in my throat. I felt a surge of love and admiration for this brave, kind-hearted girl who had been my only friend for nearly half of my life. She had remained by my side despite the danger for reasons I could not begin to comprehend. Through the years, without fail, I would find myself alone in the dark and in despair only to hear the soft sound of the secret door, and there she would be—the embodiment of all that was worth living for in this world. She was so bright and beautiful that I often felt my heart breaking when I looked at her.

"Elise…"

"Mm?"

"Why do you like me?"

Her eyelashes cast shadows over her cheeks as she looked down at her hands. "I think you're the most amazing person in the world. You're everything I wish I could be."

"_I _am?" I was absolutely flabbergasted. I had not expected that, at all. It made no sense.

She smiled sadly at me. "Yes, you are. You're so _strong_, Linnea. After everything you've been through, you still give everyone the benefit of the doubt. You want to think the best of them. You have so much love to give, and you give it to everyone. I've seen it. You're…_good_. That's what makes you stronger than your mother."

"I'm not stronger than she is," I said quietly. "You're very kind to say all of that, Elise. You're the best person I've ever known, and I don't know what I would have done without you. _You_ are good. I'm not. If you had seen me today, you would _know_ that I'm not."

"Linnea?"

"What?"

"Shut up."

She was looking at me with a kind of affectionate severity. Candlelight played over her solemn face, igniting bright embers in her caramel curls. It hurt to look at her, but I couldn't look away. There was so much kindness in her eyes, so much love. She was the very portrait of all that a noble lady should be. One day, I knew, she would make some lucky gentleman very happy.

Elise took my hand and laced her fingers through mine. It was something she had done hundreds of times, a simple gesture, but I felt a flutter of butterflies in my stomach. The day's horrors were ebbing away, and all I could think about was that I was alive, and she was _here_.

"I want to tell you a story," she said softly, squeezing my hand. "I know how much you love to read, and it was tricky finding something you _hadn't_ already read, but I did." She winked. "I had a little bit of help."

"Jasper?" I guessed.

"Can't get much by you, can I?" she laughed, wiggling her fingers against mine. "He told me that his old schoolfriend, Samuel, runs the Brightwall Academy, and would be willing to loan me a book—just one, mind you—on the condition that it be returned to Jasper within one week, in exactly the same condition in which it was received. Honestly, what is it about adults that makes them think we're still three years old?"

I grinned. "Nonsense. A dedicated librarian like Samuel wakes up sweating in the night after nightmares of dog-earing, tea stains, and torn pages. I don't think he feels that _anyone_ can be completely trusted. I'll bet you any amount of gold that the man himself wears gloves when he touches his books."

"You would know all about that, wouldn't you?" Elise said shrewdly. "I see the way you wince when people handle your books. Remember our tenth birthday? You cried when I spilled cocoa all over your atlas."

"You _saw_ me?"

"I see a lot more than you think I do." Her voice had grown solemn. "I can't be around you outside of this room. I have to climb up a secret passageway in order to see you. I've kept our secret for six years. I understand subtlety. I also know this castle better than anyone, now. Yours isn't the only room with a secret door. So Linnea, believe me when I say that I know what's been happening to you. When you fought Logan today, I was there. You didn't see me, but I saw you. Walter knows I saw you. He brought you here himself after your mother nearly killed you and I went straight to the kitchen to wait for the servants to become distracted enough that they wouldn't notice me crawling into the passageway."

She was crying again, and I drew her close to me, burying my face in her hair and hugging her as tightly as I could. "Oh, Elise," I sighed. "I'm so sorry you had to see that. I'm sorry you have to live like this. If Mother ever found out…" I shuddered. I didn't want to think about that. "I want you to be safe, Elise. If that means staying away—"

"_No_!" she said shrilly, pushing me away. Her eyes were overbright as she stared at me, hurt and angry. "Are you my friend or aren't you?"

I couldn't lie to her, as much as I wanted to. "I am."

"Then I'm not going anywhere. I love you, and I'm staying right here until you decide you don't want me around, anymore."

"I love you too, Elise." I felt shy, but I knew that I had never spoken a stronger truth. Elise was the best part of my life. "…even if you _did_ ruin my atlas."

We giggled together, the tension broken at last, and she wiped her eyes and lay down on the side of the bed that was understood to be hers whenever she could sneak into my room. The candle was burning low. Time always seemed to fly away when we were together. I felt a little flicker of dread whenever I thought about it, now. She was so lovely, and we were growing up. Soon someone would marry her, and she would have her own family to think about. There would be no more secret visits, no time for old friends. My chest tightened, burning on the inside as I relaxed against my pillow beside her. There was also the possibility that _I_ would be married to someone soon, perhaps a Prince from across the sea, someone who would take me away from all of this insanity—and away from Elise.

"What is the story you borrowed?" I asked a little unsteadily, staring up at the ceiling.

"It's a legend that predates the Old Kingdom," she replied. I could hear the smile in her voice. "When Albion was just a collection of tribal peoples, there was a rite of passage for girls of childbearing age called Firedance. The idea was that only the strongest, bravest, most selfless girls were fit to become mothers. If you could pass the trial, you had your pick of the men. It was a Matriarchal society."

I grimaced. "Don't let Mother see this book. She loves that sort of thing—"

"Don't interrupt." Elise punctuated each word with a tap on my cheek, leaning over me on her elbows. "Firedance was not a one-time rite. Firedance was an event that happened every time a girl came of age, and all who had passed through it once had to do it again with the new girl. It went like this: women would line up a bed of hot coals, very long and wide, leading to an enormous fire pit. It was very, very big, but it was also very thin. Each woman would dance over the coals for the duration of a special song, and when the song was over, and they had achieved what they called the 'higher state of consciousness' they would walk straight through the fire. When they passed through, they would be totally unharmed."

"Why?"

"It proved to themselves—not to the other women, but to themselves, that's very important—that they had hidden reserves of strength and courage. One act of bravery leads to another, see? First the coals, then the fire. What I like about it is that it wasn't just something you did once. You danced again and again, all your life. You went back into the fire willingly. I think that's ever so romantic. And since you had all the other women with you, you were never alone until you were actually in the fire itself…and by that time, you were ready."

Her eyes were bright and unfocused as she looked down at me; she must have been imagining herself dancing through the coals and the fire. I smiled. Elise would have done it in a heartbeat, given the chance.

"I would dance with you," I heard myself say—I even felt a stinging in my eyes, as from smoke. "I would spend my whole life dancing with you."

Her lips parted and she drew a breath as if to reply, but instead she stared at me, blushing pink. She was holding the breath she had taken. Her blue eyes were getting harder and harder to see in the flickering light of the candle, but they closed a little and I realized with some puzzlement that she was staring at my chin.

"You would?" she whispered.

"I would." I smiled up at her, then lost my breath. The candlelight was playing over her parted lips. So full and bright, they were... They made me think of cream and strawberries. Oranges could not have been further from my mind than they were, now. "You know I would," I whispered back. "I'd do anything you asked of me, Elise."

She swallowed, then licked her lips. A shiver passed through her slender body, but she held my eyes with hers with an expression helpless frustration. Long moments passed this way, and I realized that I was trembling, too.

"I'm scared, Linny," she murmured at last, her voice cracking.

"Why?"

"Because I want to kiss you." Her gaze moved over my face, returning quickly to my eyes. It was indeed fear that I saw there, and pain, sorrow, and love—above all, love. And there was the smallest glimmer of hope, too. She was quivering with the enormity of what she had just done, but she was no coward. She stood by her word and she would wait as long as it took for an answer.

"I'm scared, too, Elise," I said softly, raising a quaking hand to brush a tendril of caramel-colored hair behind her ear.

Her eyelids seemed to grow heavy for a moment. "Why?"

"Because I want you to kiss me."

Her breath came out in a long rush, and we stared at each other for a moment, wide-eyed. Then her mouth came crashing down against mine, her hands sliding into my hair. I felt tears fall onto my cheeks and did not know whether they belonged to her or to me. Her lips were warm and sweet, her curls soft and smooth between my fingers. The only sound was our mingled breathing. We had stopped trembling the moment our bodies had entwined. It was, after all, what we had wanted for so long—to be so close as to be inseparable in the most literal sense of the word. Through her thin cotton shift, I felt her warmth sinking into my body, easing the pain of my wounds and my aching muscles. All the while, our lips moved together, clumsily, innocently, tenderly.

Anxiety broke through the haze of my joy. I had never been kissed, before—what if I was doing it wrong? What if I was a bad kisser?

_Well then, she would probably stop kissing me._

I firmly resolved to be an _excellent_ kisser.

* * *

**Author's Note:** _Thank you for reading! Please leave a line or two of feedback. It helps so much. It really does._


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